The Permanent Mission of Afghanistan in Vienna participated in the 16th Meeting of the States Parties to the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on Their Destruction, held in Vienna from 18-21 December 2017.

We deeply thank the Secretary General of the OSCE, Ambassador Lamberto Zannier, for his kind condolence letter, and we may quote: “It was with shock and profound sadness that I learned of today’s terrorist attack … Allow me to offer my deepest sympathy and sincere condolences to the families of the victims. The OSCE joins the international community in standing united in combatting terrorism in all its manifestations.”

Afghanistan has been an OSCE Partner for Co-operation since 2003 and the OSCE has provided essential programmes and projects for stakeholders from Afghanistan ever since. Furthermore, the OSCE has deployed Election Support Teams to all elections that took place in Afghanistan since 2004.

On the occasion of the Liberation Day of Afghanistan, the Embassy and Permanent Mission, including the Consular & Visa Section of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan will remain closed on Tuesday, 14 February 2017.

I wish to join the previous speakers in welcoming Ambassador Markus Müller, Head of the OSCE Office in Tajikistan back to the Permanent Council and thanking him for his comprehensive report.

The Government of Afghanistan highly appreciates the excellent work carried out by the OSCE Office in Tajikistan, including the OSCE Border Management Staff College (BMSC).

Since its inauguration in 2009, the BMSC has proven to be a highly effective and very visible institution among many other successful OSCE activities. Last year alone, 122 participants from Afghanistan graduated from the BMSC’s courses. Female participants from Afghanistan also attended the Border Management Staff Course organized exclusively for Women Leaders. Afghanistan is interested in further improving the gender ratio of our participants at the BMSC’s courses, and we also highly value long-term training programs with the objective of sustainable outcomes such as “train-the-trainers” programs.

Looking to the Activity Plan for 2016, we see a large number of significant events during the second half of this year and I wish to seize this opportunity to thank Ambassador Müller, BMSC Director Ms. Dita Nowicka and their colleagues in Dushanbe for their excellent work and continued co-operation. Let me also thank Tajikistan for hosting all these activities as well as all donors for their contributions.

We appreciate that the BMSC, when developing courses, takes into account the fact that a number of challenges are increasingly of transnational nature and interconnected. Terrorism and illicit drugs, trafficking of human beings as well as of arms and weapons and other types of organized crime pose huge challenges to all of us. The OSCE’s Border Security and Management Concept has proven to be an effective tool in addressing these threats, and the respective training programs remain vital means to prepare us for effectively applying this concept.

Let me also re-emphasize that the Government of Afghanistan is highly interested in further expanding our co-operation with Tajikistan and other Central Asian OSCE participating States, and with the OSCE as a whole, with a view to both addressing our common challenges as well as to unlocking existing potentials for regional economic co-operation. In this context, I am pleased to inform you that this morning the work on the CASA-1000 power project — an important regional project — was inaugurated during a ceremony in Dushanbe in the presence of the heads of governments and states of the concerned countries, Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, and Tajikistan.

In closing, I wish to state that we would appreciate being increasingly involved in the activities of the organization including training and capacity-building opportunities.